Mekedatu Project

Mekedatu Project Latest News

The Supreme Court recently dismissed a petition filed by Tamil Nadu to review a November 2025 decision that termed the State’s challenge to Karnataka’s proposed Mekedatu Balancing Reservoir cum Drinking Water project as “premature”.

About Mekedatu Project

• It is a multi-purpose (drinking water and power) project involving the construction of a balancing reservoir near Kanakapura in the Ramanagara district, Karnataka. 
• It is about 90 km away from Bengaluru and 4 km ahead of the border with Tamil Nadu.
• The project is proposed at the confluence of the Cauvery River with its tributary Arkavathi.
• The plan involves building a 99-metre-high, 735-metre-long concrete gravity dam, an underground powerhouse, and a water conductor system.
• It will have a capacity to store 67 tmcft of water, supplying drinking water to Bengaluru and generating 400 MW of power.  
• Once built, the Mekedatu dam will submerge more than 5,000 hectares of protected area in the Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary.
• Issue:
  • Tamil Nadu, the lower riparian state, has been opposing the project, raising apprehensions that the state would be affected if the project takes shape. 
  • Tamil Nadu says, Mekedatu area represents the last free point in Karnataka from where Cauvery water flows unrestricted into Tamil Nadu, and the Mekedatu dam project is an attempt by Karnataka to block this free flow of water.

Source: TH

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